Richmond dispatch. [volume] (Richmond, Va.) 1884-1903, 1887-11-09

heap OF trouble. They are all turning
into guides now to show tourists around.
Last year an enormous lot OF east.
ern people came to visit Chinatown, and
all the Chinese fancy stores dids roaring
business. There were only few I'D
Chinatown. and as all the Boston and
New York and Chicago people wanted to
take away Chinese 6ric-d-brGc the stock
on hand was cleaned out soon. This
year, if you notice, the Chinese are fully
prepared for q rush of trade. Every
other store is fancy one, and they are
all stocked with vases, cups, fans, idols.
and other curios that take the eye OF the
eastern visitor. Prices have been raised
1000 per cent and if the crowd comes
the same as last year most of the Chi
nese storekeepers will make fortune.
The reporter pursued his explorations
and found. as the officer had said. that
the tribe of bric.d-brdc vendors had won
derfully multiplied Their wares shone
from windows in every direction. In one
place as many as half dozen stores had
sprung mp side by side. 1t was evident,
700, that already the boom in Oriental
pottery and feather-work had begun, for
here and there strangers could be seen
peering at the crowded windows or bear
ing off armfuls of vases and cups. What
seemed strangsstin the display was that
no two of the stores near each other
exhibited the same style of goods. One
storekeeper stocked his windows with
dark wares, the next man had lighter
pottery of entirely different patterns, the
next had still another variety, and so on
to the end Of the rows. The special
officer finished the explanation.
"Ihese Chinese storekeepers are the
shrewdest people in the world, said he.
"Now, all them stores in that block be-
/ long to the same company. You see
/ there's one at the corner that's big
one. They sell a good deal of fine brio
/ a-brQc there-that is old style china
/ that's worth money and vases with lot
of gold inlaid work on them. Most of
| the tourists come up this way and they
first visit that big store. Generally the
prices don't suit them and they go right
away next door. Next door there is a
big assortment of flashy 6ric-0-br0c that
looks well, but Judge, l am told,
wouldn't pack most of it home if
ne got it for nothing. Well. if the
tourist is green in the business they sell
him cheap stuff at big profit, and any
how he finds that he can I do any better
than in the first shop on real fine goods.
BY the time he gets round the five or six
shops he makes up his mind if he wants
to invest heavily he had better have left
his money at the cornerstone. Each of
the storekeepers, however, tells him the
other one is noted thief and a high
binder who is constantly robbing tour
lists. They all pretend to be deadly enc
mics 10 each other, and to be cutting
down prices 50 as to run each other out
of the block. The fact is, though, that
they re all in cahoot. and every night
alter the stores close the directors meet
and compare notes. Prices are marked
off for next day for each store, and the
profits are regularly divided, just the
same as any other pool. It's a very keen
tourist that they don't take In before he
gets out OF their block.
Another thing the Chinese are doing
SlIltE llt lllSlt Vi lONli lHlN kun 10 AhhliiF
up shows FOR the visitors. You know
the owners of opium-joints don't like to
have any visitors not smokers come in.
for you never know who they may find
in the Joint, aud it's against the law any
how to keep one. Then sometimes you
might call at a noted Joint and see no.
thug, only a cOupleof old empty hunks.
The Chinese have got now to taking up
opium joints and joss-hOuses and high
binders dens for greenhorn tourists.
When the Chinese guide is seen coming
MP the street with a couple Of tourists in
tow, the scout at the corner flies up to
the lottery-shop or opiumjoint and
gives the warming. Many OF the bric-d-
6rGc shops are lottery-shops, too. Ii the
guide gives the signal for a bric d-brdc
sale the lottery implements are thrown
aside and the demure-looking gamblers
get behind the counter to dispose Of some
Of the snide pottery Oh han lkerchiefs
hung up in the window as blind. Il
the tourists want to see an Opium-lOint
they are shown into SONS back bed room
with ten or fifteen hunks, all filed with
Chinese loafers, stuffed m for the Occa-
sion, and who get Whit at the pipe for
their trouble. 1t is tn, same way with
the bogus highbinders' (ens. The tourist
is steered through a couple Of loud
smelling back alleys and up and down
half dozen rickety stairs, and finally
shown into a room where four or five
Chinese t)ughs are playing tan with big,
heavy TcvOlvers sticking out of their
coats Just as the Tourist gets III they
raise "A frightful row and shake their fists
threateningly at the guide, who explains
that they are mortalIy offended at the
intrusion, but can lie appeased by a
quarter pound of opium. Generally the
frightened visitor hands over the coin,
and the trouble ends till the next green
horn comes along"
From an American cORnOissCUr the re-
porter subsequently obtained additional
information about the newest industry
IN Chinatown.
"Some years ago, said the cOnn0is-
sem, lone could obtain in Chinese
stores really beautiful specimens of
Chinese carving and Chinese ware.
The stuff lately exhibited, however, is
nearly all of the catchpenny order, and,
what is more, much OF it is not Chinese
at all, but European. OF late the
French have come to make limitations of
Chinese wares that puzzle even an ex-
pert. These connterieits are made by
machinery and sold at so cheap a rate
that they absolutely defy Chinese COM
petition. When it comes to the fine
products of manual labor, OF course the
Chinese wares cannot be cOunterieited
at "a profit, for labor is too cheap
in Asia | would call most OF
the stuff now exhibited in the
windows in Chinatown rubbish Of
the worst kind, and / cannot see how any
person OF taste would lumber up his par
lor with II. Prices have gone mp enor-
mously within the last year. however,
and the commonestrubbishi III the way OF
vases are now marke at from S2.5 a
pair to 325. Formerly they could have
been bought for sums varying between
80 cents and IS. A really fine pair of
Chinese vases, literally inlaid with gold,
were sold last week for 500, and were
worth probably $3.50, according to old
prices. II is remarkable, however, that
the class of work nov turned out by the
best Chinese artisans does not equal
/ Tho of,orte 81 tba old scbcol The nay-